Professor R. Scott Frey, head of Sociology Dept. at the University of Tennessee, a renowned public university in the US, was invited by the Sociology Dept. at ECNU to give an academic report titled “Flow of harmful materials in the world system: taking ship-breaking in Asia as an example” in room 325, Law and Business Building, Minghang Campus, attracting numerous teachers and students from sociology and other depts. Associate Professor Wei Wei of Sociology Dept. held the lecture.
Prof. Frey’s lecture was divided into five parts. In the first part he discussed the issue of inequality of environment in the world (economical) system. He showed the unequal transactional process of the world system in terms of ecology, through the analysis of wealth distribution in the world and the reality of the world system. Prof. Frey believes that wealth flows from the surrounding countries with reach resources to the core industrial countries, causing issues of exhausted resources and degradation and pollution in the surrounding countries, who are very fragile in dealing with the crisis caused by those harmful materials, due to their limited public consciousness and educational resources; In the second part, he introduced study of ship-breaking in the world system and several basic facts with it; In the third part, using plenty of actual pictures, Prof. Frey brought in several ship-breaking cases in Alang, India and Chittagong, Bangladesh and living condition of ship-breakers to analyze the reality they disclose; In the fourth part, he further discussed risk with health and environment related to ship-breaking, including poisonous and harmful materials formed in the process of ship-breaking, disgusting working condition for ship-breakers, etc.; In the fifth part, Prof Frey summarized transnational reaction to ship-breaking study, including comments from Green Peace and many other nongovernmental organizations. He concluded his lecture with this: “For the bourgeoisie, there is only one solution for its pollution problems: let them flow.”
